Court Rules That “Patent Troll” Is Opinion, Not Defamation
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For example, from Oxford I see "(in folklore) an ugly creature depicted as either a giant or a dwarf." Well, which is it?
Further to that, is Troll always a derogatory term? Some think of them as ugly, but apparently in Scandinavian folklore, trolls may be ugly and slow-witted, or look and behave exactly like human beings, with no particularly grotesque characteristic about them.
Again, these important issues are left unresolved by the New Hampshire Supreme Court. Truly an opportunity lost.
That's apparently how the Court understands it.
> In Scandinavian mythology, trolls are large, ugly, unfriendly, brutish, slow-witted, anti-Christian creatures said to dwell in isolated rocks, mountains, or caves. In the movie, there are two main types of trolls: mountain trolls and woodland trolls. Subtypes include Ringlefinch, Tosserlad, Rimetosser, Mountain Kings, the Harding, and Jotnar.
But it doesn't say what they do, in addition to dwelling.
I don't know that they essentially do anything. There are many stories... they kind of just do unfriendly people things? mostly... they guard treasure and sleep for thousands of years sometimes?
And then there's online trolling: https://gizmodo.com/the-first-internet-troll-1652485292
They guard whatever it is that they're trying to dominate :)
But since there is no clear agreed-upon definition of "patent troll", it is impossible to prove whether it is a false statement or not.
I admit though, that trolling does admit some sense of what trawling defines.
In Master of Magic, Trolls are the physically strongest race, with high hit points and attack strength as well as regeneration. A band of War Trolls led by a clever Warlord will bring glorious conquest to the worlds of Arcanus and Myrror. Derogatory, forsooth!
A patent troll is as a patent troll does.
Of course that makes sense. If the government can stop you from spending $500 billion to put a sign on the moon, “because money isn’t speech,” then the government can stop you from spending $500 at Kinkos to print signs for a protest, for the exact same reason. If the government can use control of money to control speech, it has vast powers over speech because huge amounts of speech involves the expenditure of money. You pay AWS to host your political site? If Citizens United went the other way, the government could control that! Indeed, during oral argument in the Supreme Court, the lawyer for the government defending the campaign finance law was forced to admit that under the government’s view, Congress could ban books by controlling corporate expenditures: https://www.supremecourt.gov/oral_arguments/argument_transcr... (pp. 26-30). (It’s one of the most devastating concessions in a Supreme Court oral argument I’ve ever read.)
More like it legitimizes bribery as a "campaign contribution".
If not, where’s the line? Citizens United was a case about a relatively narrow question, and the opinion was well reasoned. I believe it was correct. If you think it was wrongly decided, where’s the flaw in its logic?
The second thing, giving special favors to people who helped you get elected, can be corruption, whether or not money is involved, as long as a quid pro quo arrangement can be shown. For example, few people would disagree that its core free speech for newspapers to be able to endorse candidates. (Even the government in Citizens United suggested that the freedom of the press clause might protect newspapers separately from general speech protections.) But if the Washington Post entered into a quid pro quo arrangement with Joe Biden to endorse him in return for favorable legislation that specifically benefited the newspaper, that might be prosecuted as a corrupt quid pro quo arrangement even though no money changed hands. The quid pro quo arrangement in your hypothetical--which Citizens United does not address--is what makes the corruption, not spending money to get someone elected.
Do you have an argument that would be persuasive to someone who didn't think the entire concept of a market economy leads inexorably to political corruption?
He doesn't keep the title, but otherwise he keeps the boat. It's in his slip, it's maintained by his crew (well a company he pays to crew it). That's how it is, today. You can see this in harbors around the US.
The public is in the EXACT same denial about the politicians reading the laws they pass. It's fantasy to think that the corruption isn't blatant.
How does that translate into the politician getting the boat?
In practice, I don't see real limits on campaign contributions, only limits on the amounts a candidate can control him/herself. Maybe that's enough, I don't know.